


The Night of the Fire

by MirrorMystic



Series: Wings of Rebellion [3]
Category: Fire Emblem Echoes: Mou Hitori no Eiyuu Ou | Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, Fire Emblem Series
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Family, Family Drama, Gen, Lima Beans AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-06-06 12:40:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15194993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MirrorMystic/pseuds/MirrorMystic
Summary: The Faithful have a saying: Mila provides. Duma protects.In autumn of the year 384 VC, Octavia Rothschild, eldest daughter of King Lima IV and heir to the throne of Zofia, stood with her stepmothers and half-siblings as they laid Lady Liprica to rest.On that night, Octavia and her brother Arcturus, a novice cleric in Mila’s service, learn a painful lesson: those with plenty simply have more to lose. And those without must fight to hold on to what little they do have.Heavy is the head that wears a crown, no matter how old- or young- they may be.And on the night of the fire, Princess Octavia is only sixteen...





	The Night of the Fire

**Author's Note:**

> This AU started out two weeks ago on Discord, after an offhanded remark about Desaix dying before he could kill all of Celica's siblings, and Celica's big, buff big sis killing Lima and taking the throne. 
> 
> Then we spent a whole night giving them names... and appearances... and personalities...
> 
> Well. This just goes to show what happens when you ask a Discord server full of writers "what if". 
> 
> So shout out to the group chat for coming up with this family who'll kill for each other- because everyone's trying to kill them. And if you're just joining us, well, buckle up, because I do believe you're in for a ride...

~*~  
  
In the years to come, the name ‘Octavia Rothschild’ will mean many things to many people.  
  
A Queen, certainly. ‘The fucking Queen of Zofia’, as she’d say, and she’d never let anyone forget it. A tyrant, to some. A conqueror, certainly, of worlds- and women. A terrifying opponent, or a steadfast ally. A warrior without peer. The Red Seraph. Kingslayer. Dragon-tamer. A leader of men.  
  
But before she held any of those illustrious titles- before she was the Red Queen, before she was the Rogue Princess, long before she was the Shield of Zofia…  
  
...she was sixteen years old, scratching at the hems of a dress that didn’t quite fit, fidgeting and shivering in the breeze that swept across the field.  
  
“Brothers and sisters, let us pray.”  
  
Aunt Viktoriya’s voice, clear and reverent, rings across the cemetery grounds. Octavia peeks- and she knows she shouldn’t, she’s the oldest and her aunts probably want her to set a somber, disciplined example for her siblings, but hey, she had to wear a dress to this damn thing, so maybe nobody’s getting what they want tonight.  
  
Octavia peers at the circle of her half-siblings, hemmed in by a ring of women in mourning veils. Lady Sibyl, arcane scholar, her twin daughters Sola and Luna in the crooks of her arms. Lady Aeschine, a gloved hand coming to rest in Sice’s dark hair, stilling her fidgeting, while her son, Endymion, clings glumly to her legs. Lady Alida, horse-master, reluctant to be in anything other than her riding-coat and breeches, her son Valen and his best friend Conrad nestled in her arms.  
  
Lady Liprica, laid to rest on the funeral pyre.  
  
Octavia stifles an indignant squeak when she feels an elbow jab into her ribs. She flashes a glare at her brother, Arcturus, second in line for the throne. Their guardian, Talia, meets Octavia’s eyes in warning, baby Anthiese cradled in her arms. Octavia mutters something, before piously bowing her head.  
  
“Exalted Mila, giver of life, giver of your bounty, and mother to us all: we ask of you a final boon…”  
  
The women step forward, gathering around Liprica’s pyre. Sibyl lights the first torch with a crackle of magic, and passes the flame around the ring- Aeschine, Alida. Lady Sabrina, gruff and awkward, nearly misses her cue. But she steps forward, and lights her torch from Alida’s, while her grown son watches, somber and aloof, his hands stuffed in his pockets.  
  
“Take your servant into your embrace,” Viktoriya intones.  
  
One by one, her fellow wives step forward, and set Liprica alight.  
  
“Guide this soul to a place of plenty, where justice is swift, pain is fleeting, and love is everlasting,” Viktoriya prays, her voice trembling. “Plant this soul in your garden, Mother Mila, and there, she will bloom, evergreen...”  
  
Octavia clenches her fists. She takes one last look at her aunt, beautiful and serene even in death, and tries to sear her face into her memory. It joins the faces of those who came before- Arc’s mother, Claudia. Sice’s mother, Lucille.  
  
Her own mother, Maghenyld, is little more than a shadow in her memory. Someday, she thinks, someday little Anthiese will come to her and ask her about Lady Liprica, and as her eldest sister, Octavia had better have something to say.  
  
The flames swallow up her aunt’s tranquil form. Viktoriya taps her staff against the ground, its crystal headpiece resonating, ringing like temple bells. Viktoriya lifts her head, and sings- her voice crisp and clear even as tears run down her face. Sibyl joins her, then Aeschine, Alida, Sabrina, even Talia. The six women lift their voices in one of Mila’s mourning hymns, the haunting melody rising into the breeze alongside the smoke of Liprica’s pyre, escorting her bodiless form into the sky.  
  
Octavia shudders. She clenches and unclenches her fists, her shoulders shaking.  
  
Then she feels Arc’s arm around her waist, and she can’t fight the tears anymore.  
  
~*~  
  
They spend hours in that field, arrayed on the grass. It feels strange, surreal- like they’re having a picnic right after her aunt’s died. There are coaches waiting to bring them back to their villas- but none of them have the heart to leave. The older women gather around Viktoriya, shining like a beacon in her vestments, a dove among ravens. The kids form their own group, Arc taking it upon himself to keep an eye on them.  
  
On the cusp of womanhood, Octavia sits apart, alone, aloof, filled with a tension, a simmering anger, that she can’t quite put into words.  
  
“You okay there, lass?”  
  
Octavia glances up at the scrawny redhead standing above her. He’s aunt Sabrina’s son, from her previous marriage. He’s two years older than her. He has no royal blood- but he’s a brother, nonetheless.  
  
Octavia doesn’t answer him- not really. She just heaves out a sigh. Saber plops himself down on the grass beside her. He’s not gonna let her go with just a sigh.  
  
Octavia grits her teeth, clenching her fists.  
  
“He didn’t show,” she says, her jaw tight. “I can’t believe him.”  
  
Saber shrugs. “Can’t you?”  
  
And Octavia seethes, because she _can_ believe it- because this is what they are, this is what they have been, and this is what they _will_ be for years and years to come: King Lima IV, languishing on his throne in Castle Zofia with all the comforts royalty can provide, while his wives and his children huddle together in the dark.  
  
The sun dips below the trees. A waiting footman sheepishly advises that they should depart soon- it’s dangerous after dark, even in the Zofian capital, and there’s been worrisome rumors of strange people abroad.  
  
Reluctantly, they begin dispersing to their waiting carriages- but not before a lengthy round of goodbyes. It’s something that Octavia doesn’t normally have the patience for, but there’s something about tonight, some fell wind through the trees, that makes her stop and savor every hug, every clap on the shoulder, every hand ruffling hair. She goes down the line of her siblings and murmurs her goodbyes and see-you-soons. She watches her aunts pull each other into their arms, cooing their condolences, exchanging kisses, some chaste, some less so. And the only thing Octavia can think is that this feels wrong- too real, too final, almost as if…  
  
Arc squeezes her hand, and Octavia shakes her head, swiping away those dark, unwelcome thoughts. This isn’t like her, she thinks. She’s a doer, not a thinker, not a worrier, like Arc- but what, exactly, is she supposed to do?  
  
Sibyl and the twins board their carriage and depart; Aeschine follows soon after, long-limbed and elegant even in mourning, her gaunt, pale features tinged with a tragic dignity. Endymion follows her sober example. Sice, meanwhile, can hardly sit still- it’s all she can do to avoid climbing all over her aunt, though she’s getting rather old for that now. There’s a rush of wind, and the beating of mighty wings, and then Alida and her pegasus are a shadow retreating into the night, little Valen held tight in her lap.  
  
Sabrina is among the last to depart. She’s long in leaving Viktoriya’s side, rubbing gentle circles into her back. She’s rumpling Viktoriya’s normally immaculate cleric habit, but that hardly matters now.  
  
“Oh, Vicky…” Sabrina sighs, and shakes her head. “...if there’s _anything_ I can do…”  
  
“I know,” Viktoriya murmurs. “Thank you, ‘Brina.”  
  
Sabrina gives Viktoriya’s arm one last squeeze, before reluctantly pulling away. She and Saber walk back to their carriage and vanish into the night, leaving Viktoriya alone by the remnants of Liprica’s pyre.  
  
Viktoriya sags, exhausted and hollowed out by grief. She leans her head against her staff, and lets out a shuddering breath. Without her fellow wives to carry her, it falls to Mila herself to prop her up; without her staff, without her faith, Octavia doubts there’d be anything stopping her from simply laying to rest in Liprica’s ashes and never leaving her side again.  
  
“Sister Viktoriya,” Talia says gently.  
  
Viktoriya lifts her head, and manages the ghost of a smile. She takes baby Anthiese in her arms.  
  
“I love you, Liprica,” Viktoriya whispers. “I swear, in Mila’s name, little Celica will have a mother.”  
  
“‘Celica’?” Octavia wonders, before Arc can hiss at her for quiet.  
  
“It’s the name Liprica wanted,” Viktoriya explains, her eyes growing flinty and hard. “King Lima couldn’t be bothered to see Liprica join the Mother. That man doesn’t deserve to name our child.”  
  
“ _I_ know what he deserves-” Tavi starts, but Talia cuts her off with a glare.  
  
“Is there anything else we can do for you, Sister?” Talia asks instead.  
  
Viktoriya weakly shakes her head. Little Conrad, scarcely reaching Talia’s knees, abandons his hiding spot in the folds of Talia’s cloak and clings to his mother’s leg. Viktoriya smiles sadly, a hand coming to rest in his fluffy red hair.  
  
“Give us a moment, Tali,” Viktoriya asks.  
  
Talia ushers them away to their waiting carriage as the last ribbons of pink and orange fade over the horizon. In the night, Viktoriya’s white habit and red vestments shine like stars. The moon peeks out from behind the clouds, and Viktoriya stands, haloed in its glow, looking like an angel-  
  
Or a ghost.  
  
Viktoriya lifts her voice in a funeral hymn. The plaintive melody echoes across the grounds like the loneliest of winds, and lingers in Octavia’s ears long after they’re gone.  
  
~*~  
  
“It’s not _right_ .”  
  
Octavia mutters acidly, as Talia helps her out of her funeral dress. She yanks it over her head and balls it up, a twin to the knot of wordless anger churning in her gut, and hurls it at the changing screen hard enough to knock it over.  
  
Talia catches the screen and sets it upright- pointlessly, as the only eyes they have to shield are Arc’s, and Talia had sent him to his studies as soon as they’d gotten home. Octavia snatches the pair of breeches from the pile in Talia’s hands and angrily pulls them on.  
  
“Aunt Liprica is the mother of his child, and he can’t even _show up_ ?” Octavia seethes. She’s so caught up in her anger that she trips over her breeches and falls on the floor. She barks in frustration, though her expression softens when she sees Talia’s offered hand. She sighs.  
  
Talia pulls Octavia to her feet, and hands her the neatly folded white blouse she was holding. Octavia shakes it out and pulls it on. It’s a little loose, a little billowy- too big for her, just like this villa, just like the crown she’s too eager to bear.  
  
“Perhaps he trusted Sister Viktoriya to carry out her service without him,” Talia offers.  
  
“You’re going to defend him?” Octavia snaps.  
  
“No,” Talia says, placing a hand on Octavia’s arm. “But he’s the King. He can do as he pleases.”  
  
Octavia knows that tone, and she knows well the feeling of Talia squeezing her arm. Talia’s trying- to be a parent chiding a child for their impatience, for their frustration. Never mind that Talia’s only her guardian because Octavia’s mother is dead, Arc’s mother is missing, and King Lima just stuck them in the custody of the first person he could find. Never mind that Talia’s only four years her senior, scarcely out of girlhood herself.  
  
But that touch carries within it a weary fondness that makes Octavia’s heart ache. She slumps her shoulders, sighs, and shakes her head with the helpless anger of a scolded child.  
  
“It’s not right,” she says, petulantly.  
  
“No,” Talia murmurs. “It’s not.”  
  
Their eyes meet- Talia’s warm hazelnut and Octavia’s striking crimson. Talia reaches up, and affectionately ruffles Octavia’s hair. Octavia, for her part, lets her- a privilege shared by few.  
  
“Try to get some sleep, alright, Tavi?” Talia says. “It’s been a long day.”  
  
Part of Octavia wants to grumble about how Talia’s just sending her to bed so she doesn’t stay up all night stewing. The other part of her, the part that loves and appreciates what her not-quite-servant, not-quite-sister is trying to do, relents.  
  
So Octavia tries. She really does. She lies in bed and screws her eyes shut and tries her damnedest to let it go.  
  
“You should be in bed,” Arc says without even looking up from his desk, when Octavia’s given up on trying to sleep and sulked her way to his door.  
  
“So should you,” she grumbles.  
  
Arc’s shoulders rise and fall in a casual shrug.  
  
“Tali told me to study. So, I’m studying.”  
  
Octavia pulls out the extra chair by his desk- “extra”, but she knows he keeps it there for her- spins it around, and sits on it backwards, resting on her crossed arms. Arc has his workbook splayed out on his desk. He’s taking charcoal rubbings of various herbs, and jotting down notes in the margins- or he was, until he flashes Octavia a pointed look for reading over his shoulder.  
  
“What’s that?” Octavia wonders. She pokes at the newest page in his primer, before Arc slaps her hand away.  
  
“Don’t smudge the charcoal,” Arc chides.  
  
“‘ _Pwease, Tavi, don’t wuin my dwawing!_ ’”  
  
“It’s _griproot_ ,” Arc huffs, rolling his eyes. “Chop it up, steep it into tea, and you have a fine anesthetic. Alternatively, dry it, grind it to powder, and you have a potent paralytic that will stop a man’s heart if you’re not careful with the dosing.”  
  
“What, do they teach you that second part at scholam?”  
  
“‘For every poison, there is a cure. For every cure, a poison,’” Arc recites. “Sister Viktoriya always talks about duality, learning both sides, that sort of thing. That’s her idea of a ‘balanced curriculum’. Whatever that means.”  
  
Arc can see the way Octavia’s eyes darken at the mention of Viktoriya. Then, because Octavia was never really one for subtlety, she slumps, boneless and melancholy, in her chair.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Arc asks, knowingly.  
  
“...I don’t know…” Octavia sighs, before sitting up straight and throwing her arms up. “Maybe it’s because it takes a funeral to get the whole family together? Maybe because our dad couldn’t bother to even show up? Maybe because we’re losing moms one by one, and Dad doesn’t seem to give a shit? I’m sick of it!”  
  
“Sick of what, Tavi?”  
  
“All of it?” Octavia grumbles, gesturing vaguely with her hand. “Like… tomorrow you’re gonna have to walk in to scholam and see Aunt Tori, and what? Act like this didn’t happen?”  
  
“We don’t pretend, Tavi,” Arc says. “We move on. Life goes on.”  
  
“Even when you don’t want to?” Octavia wonders. “Gods, did you _see_ Aunt Tori earlier tonight? She was so… so…” She shakes her head, groaning. “And- And I bet Dad didn’t even _get out of bed!_ ”  
  
“I’m not surprised,” Arc mutters. “By either of them. Dad’s… Dad. And Aunt Tori, well… I mean, it wasn’t my business. But Tali tells me she and Aunt Liprica were… quite close.”  
  
Octavia grits her teeth. She clenches her fists, pounds her fists into her thighs and springs up so suddenly the back of her chair hits the floor with a crack.  
  
“ _That’s it!_ ” Octavia cries.  
  
Arc looks dubious.  
  
“ _What_ ’s it, Tavi? What are you doing?”  
  
“I am going to go check on Aunt Tori and make sure she’s okay, because Mila knows our dad won’t do a damn thing!” Octavia announced, stabbing a finger into Arc’s chest. “And _you_ are gonna come with me!”  
  
“What, we’re just going to _walk_ to her villa in the middle of the night?”  
  
“She’s just down the road. We’ll be _fine_ ,” Octavia insists. “I just want to make sure she’s not… I don’t know… alone with her grief? Look, are you with me or not?”  
  
Arc fixes her with a look- the “this is a harebrained scheme” look. He rolls his eyes. He heaves a sigh.  
  
He still claps his primer shut and follows her out the door.  
  
The shadows of their villa stretch out around them. Every doorway towers over their heads. This villa was once the home of Maghenyld the Red, a giant of a woman who’d made a fortress of a house in the style of the mead halls of her homeland- stone-faced, gloomy, roaring hearths and furs on the walls.  
  
Maghenyld the Red was a terror on the battlefield, but her strength only went so far. Even she couldn’t survive the strain of having eight children, all at once. Her nurses and midwives did the best they could, but Octavia’s seven siblings did not survive- and neither did her mother. Not even Mila’s clerics could grant Maghenyld the strength to endure. Rumors spread, whispers of ill omen, that this disastrous miscarriage was a sign of Mila’s disfavor with the king.  
  
Thus it was that Octavia was not, strictly, the eldest of King Lima’s children- she was simply the only one left. King Lima used the number eight as her namesake, and didn’t bother naming the rest.  
  
When Maghenyld passed away, the villa fell into the hands of King Lima’s newest paramour- Lady Claudia, a Cleric of Mila, and Arc’s mother. She remade the villa into something more to her liking- a cloister of faith, sparse hallways, icons on the walls, gleaming arches, candelabra.  
  
Then Lady Claudia went missing, years ago, and little Tavi and Arc grew up together with two ghosts on their shoulders and a house too big for either of them to fill alone.  
  
Tavi stops just short of the front door, throws open the coat closet and pulls her traveling cloak down off its peg. The brown fabric is coarse, itchy, and absolutely not Tavi’s color, but autumn has come in force and she’ll be thankful for it once they’re out in the wind. She catches a glance of herself in a standing vanity by the door. Mane of red hair, striking red eyes, traveling cloak, loose white blouse, breeches. Tavi’s never considered herself as having a mind for fashion. But she knows when she looks good.  
  
“You know what’d really pull this outfit together?” Tavi muses, cocking a hand on her hip. “A belt. Maybe a sword belt.”  
  
“Maybe if you were any good with a sword,” Arc shrugs.  
  
“Punk,” Tavi rolls her eyes. “Hey, Arc. Have you seen my boots?”  
  
There’s a sharp thud behind her and she squeaks in surprise. She whirls around to find her boots sitting on the floorboards, a lantern shining in her face-  
  
-and Talia, with a face more annoyed than surprised, tapping her foot, a hand on her hip.  
  
“What are you two up to?” Talia asks sternly. “Or, rather, what are  _you_ up to, Tavi, that you’re dragging Arc along with you?”  
  
Tavi laughs- that too-loud, too-shrill laugh when she knows she’s been caught red-handed.  
  
“Oh, hey, Tali. We were, uh… we were thinking of… going to visit Aunt Tori. Since, y’know. This is a difficult time for her, and all.”  
  
Talia raises an eyebrow. “In the middle of the night.”  
  
“Yep.”  
  
“Alone.”  
  
“Uh-huh.”  
  
“Do you even know the way to her villa?”  
  
Tavi runs a sheepish hand through her hair. “Oh, it’s just down the road, right? ...Right?”  
  
Talia doesn’t budge. She meets the younger girl’s eyes, before turning and studying Arc’s face, his features frozen in a mask of calm. Talia’s eyes flicker between the two- Arc, neutral and deceptively meek, Tavi like a puppy who knocks over your potted plants but still sits there, covered in potting soil, and smiles at you when you get home.  
  
Talia takes a deep breath, and heaves a sigh that could move mountains.  
  
“...Put on your boots.”  
  
~*~  
  
They set out upon the road, three souls huddling against the brisk autumn chill, their lantern bobbing on its pole as they venture out into the dark.  
  
The moon drifts behind the clouds, hiding her silver face behind her own mourning veil. A foul wind sweeps across the whole of Valentia- a shadow that emerges from Rigel in the north and bubbles over into Zofia to the south. The darkness churns, frothy and toxic, so unlike the sacred night cut through with violet nebulae and twinkling stars.  
  
Shadows gather beneath the shrouded moon, emerge from the trees-  
  
\- and become men, soldiers, dozens strong, bearing spears, axes, and flying no banner save the red capes falling from their shoulders.  
  
The target lay on the hill beyond, hearthfire still glowing in its windows. The raiding party mutter amongst themselves, agitated, eager.  
  
Their commander crosses her arms, blowing out an irritated sigh. The undisciplined mob behind her could hardly be called Rigel’s finest. Perhaps it took only the most resolute minds- or the most stupid- to willingly shatter the Divine Accord.  
  
“This is the place,” she mutters, raking her fingers through her short, dark, choppy hair. She flashes a conspiratorial glance to the spy beside her, cloaked in shadow and black leather, a scarf wrapped tight around his mouth. “Or so Master Jedah’s magics claim.”  
  
The assassin- Flint- nods, his eyes glinting in what flickers of moonlight penetrate the clouds.  
  
“A Brand-bearer has been born. A babe in arms. A perfect target.”  
  
“Will you be joining us against such a formidable foe?” she laughs.  
  
Flint shakes his head. “No. I am only here to observe. Mind your mission, Sister- you will return to Rigel with the Brand-bearer alive or not at all.”  
  
“I know my orders,” she snarls. “I chose to lead this mission.”  
  
Flint dips his head- a fraction of an inch. “Because it’s her?”  
  
She swallows. Nods. “Because it’s her.”  
  
~*~  
  
In the heart of her cloister, Viktoriya prays.  
  
The sanctum has no windows, but nonetheless, the ranks of candles flicker and sway in an otherworldly breeze. Viktoriya takes a deep breath, taking in the scents of incense and candle wax, of dressed stone and fresh linen, the faint, ephemeral hint of autumn, and something fainter still- the scent of fear. Anticipation. Change.  
  
Viktoriya pulls herself to her feet, gazing up at the impassive stone likeness of Mila above her. She reaches out and clasps the Earth Mother’s hand in benediction, heaving a sigh.  
  
She turns, resplendent in her white gown and striking crimson outer robe. She takes up her staff and strikes the ground, the crystal headpiece ringing down the cloister halls.  
  
In that moment, she is Exalted Viktoriya, High Priestess of Zofia, the very picture of serene grace and queenly composure. For a moment, her face is a perfect mirror to Mila’s sculpted form behind her- tranquil, untouched by pain or worry, suffused with the divine.  
  
That mask disappears when she grimly meets the eyes of her companions- an enchantress in black trimmed with white and gold, and a stern knight-captain in his armor and riding leathers, his gloved hand resting in a shock of curly red hair.  
  
Little Conrad pokes his head out from his hiding place behind the captain’s knees, and comes waddling up to his mother on his little legs. Viktoriya pulls him into her arms, savoring the feeling of his little head against her shoulder.  
  
Baby Celica is still as a stone, swaddled in cloth in the crook of the captain’s arm. She’s scarcely a week old, far too young to have the signature Rothschild red hair, freckles, her family’s gaunt cheekbones hidden among her baby fat. Soldier he may be, but even the captain can’t suppress a smile at her chubby, rosy face.  
  
“Oh, she’s a treasure,” Mycen coos, chuckling. “Her name’s ‘Celica’, you said?”  
  
“Yes,” Viktoriya nods. “As Liprica intended.”  
  
“I’m almost glad she’s not here for this mess,” Mycen mutters, before he can stop himself. His eyes snap to Viktoriya’s, his jaw tightening in a wince. “...Forgive me, Lady Exalt. That was a terrible thing to say.”  
  
Viktoriya shakes her head, somber.  
  
“No. No, you’re right.” Viktoriya murmurs. “Perhaps it’s better she was spared.”  
  
Viktoriya clutches her staff tight in her hands, as if it’s the only thing holding her up. She takes a shuddering breath, and sets Conrad down. He clings to Viktoriya’s legs, one hand sticking his thumb in his mouth, the other clutching a tiny fistful of Viktoriya’s red robe. She smooths his hair against his scalp, glancing up and pointedly meeting Mycen’s eyes.  
  
“...If you do this, it’s desertion,” Viktoriya warns. “Perhaps even treason.”  
  
“It’s desertion, me just being here,” Mycen grumbles. “If Lima had his way, I’d still be holed up in the castle, like the rest of my men. As for treason… well. I serve a country, not a throne.”  
  
A fell wind blows through the shrine, heedless of the stone walls around it. The stands of candles gutter in the unearthly breeze.  
  
“Vicky,” Lady Sibyl says, urgent, attentive.  
  
Viktoriya exhales. She gets down on one knee, squeezing Conrad’s shoulder.  
  
“Mommy has something she needs to do,” Viktoriya coos. “I need you to go with Captain Mycen, okay? I’ll be back as soon as I can.”  
  
Little Conrad nods, his thumb still in his mouth. Viktoriya pulls him close and presses a kiss into his scalp. She ushers him forward, and he waddles back to Mycen’s side, taking shelter behind his knees.  
  
“No matter what happens,” Viktoriya begins, “don’t turn back. Don’t stop, not for me, not for anyone. Get them as far away from this conflict as you can- and as soon as I’m able… I will join you.”  
  
“Be safe, Lady Exalt,” Mycen dips his head. “Mila provides.”  
  
“And Duma protects,” Viktoriya answers.  
  
“Come on, son,” Mycen says gently. He hefts baby Celica in his arms and ushers Conrad forward with a hand on his back.  
  
Viktoriya watches them go, her heart in tatters- but her face, like Mila’s, is set in stone.  
  
~*~  
  
Shadows gather in the trees beyond the cloister walls. Shadows bearing axes, lances, and the aches of a harried march south, their fatigue melting away in the heat haze of bloodlust. The priestess scowls at the ‘soldiers’ she’s been assigned- mere animals, gripping their weapons with white-knuckled fists, panting and growling and baying for blood.  
  
“Our full strength is nearly gathered,” Flint reports, arms crossed, his features obscured by his hood and the scarf tied tight around his mouth. “Still some stragglers coming in. But do feel free to call the attack now if you’re so eager for your little reunion.”  
  
“Hush,” she growls. She jerks her head towards the armed crowd behind them. “Watch your tone, assassin. It’s bad enough I have to share tonight with that _deviant_ .”  
  
“A deviant, you say?”  
  
The priestess grits her teeth, flinching at the mellifluous voice that oozes like honey from the assembled crowd. A man steps forward- drifts forward, really, on a cloud of black smoke, impeccably dressed in a fine suit and tie, a staff in one hand, and the tell-tale violet glow in his eyes. His voice is poison, laced with sugar to brighten the taste. The deathly pallor of his skin, the way he floats just above the ground, his legs ending in coils of black smoke- these are the signs of one who has grasped the cup of Duma’s power and gleefully drank their fill. But most unnerving are the six women who follow at his heels and hang on to his every word- beautiful women, their dark gowns clinging to deathly gray skin, with perfect smiles and eyes like glass. They fan out behind him, an entourage dressed for the stage, and bow in a unison no amount of ‘rehearsal’ could achieve.  
  
“You call me deviant, Sister Ashe,” the sorcerer says, tugging at his gloves, “but King Lima IV would call me kin. In this country, even the king himself holds many brides.”  
  
Sister Ashe of the Duma Faithful hisses in disgust as her name passes the sorcerer’s lips. In her mind’s eye, she can see the threads of magic binding the witches to his will- threads of fire coiling around their fingers in a mockery of wedding bands.  
  
“Those _puppets_ of yours are no longer human,” Sister Ashe spits.  
  
“Neither am I,” the Conductor says, lips split in a vicious grin. “Neither are you.”  
  
Ashe bites back her retort. She glances over her shoulder at her assembled company and waves them forward, out of the trees.  
  
“Fan out!” she barks. “Surround the villa and make sure the Brand-bearer doesn’t escape. We need the child _alive_ , you hear me? Do what you like with everyone else, but take the girl alive!”  
  
Her men grunt in acknowledgement, melting away through the shadows- a tide of ink closing like fingers around a throat. Ashe draws her sword, glinting beneath the baleful, shrouded moon, casting a scornful glance at the sorcerer and his thralls behind her.  
  
“Conductor,” she growls.  
  
“Yes, Sister?”  
  
“Smoke them out.”  
  
The Conductor smiles- an eminently slimy, dangerous thing.  
  
“...It would be my pleasure.”  
  
He stabs his staff into the ground like a spear, its twined wooden branches unfurling into a stand. He sets a tome into its grip, the magicked pages fluttering as it settles on the right passage with a will of its own. The Conductor reaches up and pulls up his jacket’s high collar, before reaching into his coat and drawing a wand.  
  
“Now then, ladies,” he says, smiling that wicked grin, “just like we did in rehearsal…”  
  
He taps his makeshift music stand, and an orange glow, like an ember, comes to life at the head of his wand.  
  
He rhythmically traces a pattern in the air, his wand leaving a burning sigil in its wake. The Chorus gather behind him, and begin to sing- an eerie, haunting melody that settles like a stone of dread in the stomachs of all who hear it. And as the Chorus raise their voices in a sharp, dissonant harmony, the spell pattern he’s tracing in the air pulses and throbs with power, shining like a star of omen in the moonless night…  
  
~*~  
  
Viktoriya stands in her shrine at the heart of the cloister, anxiety thrumming through her veins. She takes a deep breath, and strikes her staff against the ground, ringing like a church bell across the grounds. She looks up, meeting Lady Sibyl’s eyes.  
  
“There’s no more time,” Sibyl says weakly, wringing her hands. “I wish… I wish I could have done more.”  
  
“Your foresight is the reason we had any time at all,” Viktoriya says gently.  
  
Sibyl is among the youngest of Viktoriya’s sister-wives, her chipper demeanor normally at odds with her dark, gloomy wardrobe. But tonight, in the wake of Liprica’s passing and calamity just around the corner, it’s all she can do just to coax Viktoriya into a smile.  
  
She reaches out to clasp Viktoriya’s hand. Viktoriya’s fingers pass ghostlike through her hazy, luminous form. But the thought is there. The sentiment shines through.  
  
“Your sisters are with you, Vicky,” Sibyl manages a smile. “...In... a manner of speaking.”  
  
Viktoriya smiles. Almost laughs. But then they hear it- the wicked melody staining the air, a song that pulses with magic and makes Sibyl’s projected form flicker and blur.  
  
“I love you-” Sibyl blurts out, urgent, as if she’ll never get a chance to say it again- and then her form vanishes into mist, smothered by the miasma of dark magic descending upon the cloister.  
  
Viktoriya lifts her staff and strikes it against the ground. Its resonant hum is deep and mournful, like a funeral bell.  
  
“It’s time,” Viktoriya says, resolute. “She’s here.”  
  
~*~  
  
“-and then she fell down the stairs!” Talia laughs.  
  
“Stop! Telling! People! That! Story!” Tavi cries, thumping her fists against Talia’s shoulders.  
  
“No, no, I want to hear this…!” Arc grins, stifling snickers.  
  
“So- So she slides down the stairs, her butt banging on every step- thunk! Thunk! Thunk! And when she reaches the bottom, she’s so mad! She gets up, puts her hands on her hips, and yells at the stairs for their audacity! ‘I am a princess! Fight me, stairs!’”  
  
Talia and Arc have a good cackle at Tavi’s expense, Talia laughing so hard the lantern pole wobbles and sets their shadows dancing. Tavi just crosses her arms and huffs, indignant. Talia reaches out and lays a fond hand in Tavi’s hair. Tavi pouts, but she leans into the touch, regardless.  
  
“I’ll have you know, if I had my axe, I would’ve chopped those stairs into kindling,” Tavi mutters. “I would’ve kicked those stairs’ asses.”  
  
“Oh, like they kicked yours?” Arc asks dryly. Tavi thumps him on the head.  
  
Viktoriya’s cloister looms just over the rise. But before they can crest the hill, they see them- shadows lurking on the road, bearing no lanterns, flying no flags.  
  
“Who goes there?” One of the men barks out in challenge. Talia raises a hand, peaceably.  
  
“Handmaiden Talia, of House Rothschild, with her wards... “ Talia trails off. She can hear it in the wind- the fell melody, six women’s voices raised in song, but twisted somehow, less of a hymn and more of a dirge…  
  
She almost doesn’t hear the whistling of the arrow, black as night. Almost.  
  
She darts aside, the arrow punching a hole through her traveling cloak even as she instinctively pulls Arc and Tavi into her embrace.  
  
“What... Why...?” Arc sputters in disbelief. Talia shoves him and Tavi off the side of the road, and they scurry into the woods at Talia’s urging, arrows whistling past.  
  
~*~  
  
Lady Sibyl had a vision of the fire that would consume the cloister. She came to Viktoriya and her house staff, bodiless, to tell them what was coming- but a warning is only ever a warning. It’s nothing compared to the real thing.  
  
There is no first spark, no tell-tale wisp of smoke. There is no smouldering tinder that can be stamped out before it catches fire. There is only the song, the witch-hymn that encircles the cloister in its haunting haze, pulsing, thrumming, pounding in the air-  
  
Until the whole cloister goes ablaze with light.  
  
The wretched, ghastly keening immediately gets drowned out by the sound of roaring flames that weren’t there an instant ago. It’s horrifying, surreal, like a gruesome image that flashes across the back of your eyes when your mind wanders, and you blink it away, shaking off the intrusive thought- only for it to persist, a waking nightmare that’s suddenly horribly, horribly real.  
  
Flames erupt and consume the cloister, so intense that the stone walls dribble molten rock like candle wax. Viktoriya’s clerics and house servants flee from the flames, their terror amplified by the Chorus and their witch-song. They break from the cloister halls in a blind panic, tossing aside still-burning cloaks and habits. The fire drives them from their home, scattering them into the fields- only for monsters to await them within the trees.  
  
A novice of Mila, young enough that she’s permitted to wear her hair uncovered, stumbles from the cloister’s blazing ruin. She coughs up smoke, eyes watering, running blind-  
  
-so blind she doesn’t see the blade before it runs her through.  
  
She chokes out a gasp, gagging on the blade, her eyes wide in fear and stunned disbelief. She reflexively clutches the blade with hands trembling with pain. She dips her head, sinking to her knees in a horrid echo of prayer.  
  
Sister Ashe closes her eyes, swallows her shame, and hurls the novice’s corpse onto the grass.  
  
“Find the Brand-bearer!” she screams over the inferno. “ _Find the girl!_ ”  
  
~*~  
  
From one moment to the next, the cloister was in flames.  
  
It happens in an eyeblink- like the screaming whistle of a kettle you’d forgotten you’d put on to boil.  
  
The spell explodes through the ethereal world of astral space, sending ripples that can be felt even in the physical world. The blast hurls Talia, Tavi, and Arc off their feet, sending them tumbling through the undergrowth, clinging to each other for comfort and familiarity when it seems, to all witnesses, like the world is about to end. Even on the edges of Viktoriya’s estate, they can feel the intense heat, the radiant inferno painting them crimson and gold.  
  
“Aunt Tori!” Tavi screams.  
  
“What’s going on?” Arc babbles, frantic. “Who- Who were those men?”  
  
“Be calm. Be calm!” Talia urges, though by the tremor in her voice she has little calm to spare. She ushers them forward through the trees, taking Arc by the hand and pulling when fear and horror root him in place.  
  
“What are you doing?!” Tavi demands. “Where are we going?!”  
  
“Away from the fire, Tavi, where do you think?!” Talia snaps.  
  
“Aunt Tori’s still in there!” Tavi shrieks. “Turn around! We have to go back! We have to help!”  
  
“You’re going to get yourself killed!”  
  
“ _She needs us!_ ”  
  
“ **_I_ ** _need you!_ ”  
  
Tavi stops in her tracks. A moment ago she and Talia were of a height, standing her ground, her stubborn eyes glinting in the firelight. Talia often forgets how tall she’s gotten- how strong she’s gotten, this girl who would one day be queen. But in that moment, she’s not the crown princess, destined for greatness, and nor is she a pouty child, ready for a scolding. She’s…  
  
_A sister_ , Talia realizes, and the truth of it makes her heart ache.  
  
“Hey!” A gruff voice shouts in the distance. “Hey, we’ve got live ones!”  
  
“Run, you two!” Talia barks. “Run!”  
  
They flee, headlong, through the woods, crunching twigs underfoot, briars and branches clawing at their arms. Phantoms snap at their heels, mere silhouettes save for the glint of moonlight upon axe heads, spear tips.  
  
Something snags Tavi’s boot and she falls with a cry, shielding her face with her arms as she goes tumbling through the brambles. She pulls herself up, thorns and burrs clinging to her cloak- but then someone takes a fistful of her hair and yanks. He hoists her to her feet, Tavi grunting in pain and outrage, unhooking the hand axe from his belt.  
  
The lantern shatters against the raider’s skull.  
  
Tavi gasps, flinching away from the broken glass. In the darkness, she can see more shadows approaching- and Talia, cast in the halo of Viktoriya’s blazing villa, the fire’s long, stark shadows hiding the desperate tears on her cheeks.  
  
“Run, Tavi!” she pleads.  
  
Tavi hesitates, helpless. “...Tali…”  
  
The raider groans, staggering up onto his hands and knees. Talia reaches for the closest thing at hand- and drives the glass shard into the raider’s throat.  
  
Blood gushes from the ghastly wound, looking inky and dark in the firelight. Talia stabs him, again, and again, like a woman possessed- and she is, by adrenaline, by desperation, by terror and fury- and love. Tavi sees it in her eyes when Talia lifts her head and begs her to run. Talia’s eyes are on Tavi.  
  
She doesn’t see the spear until it bursts from her chest.  
  
Talia stares straight ahead, blood dribbling down the corner of her mouth, and falls face down on the forest floor.  
  
Tavi’s scream is the thing legends are made of. She flies across the clearing, howling with fury and grief. No sooner had the raider kicked Talia from his spear blade did vengeance descend upon him- a red-haired comet that smashes him off his feet and slams his shoulders to the ground so hard his lance skitters from his grip.  
  
Tavi’s first punch slams the raider’s head against the ground; the second knocks his helmet off. The third, fourth, and fifth all blur into one another, until Tavi loses count, the man’s face is a mass of gore, and Tavi’s kneeling over a corpse, adrenaline surging through her veins.  
  
She’s at Talia’s side in an instant, gingerly rolling her over onto her back, suddenly painfully aware of all the blood- caking her hands, Talia’s hands, and weeping from the hole in her chest.  
  
“Don’t go… don’t go…” Tavi’s pleading, sounding more like a frightened child than a woman who’d just killed a man. “Come on. Come on, Tali, please, get up. I’m getting you out of here, come on…”  
  
Talia wheezes, and aspirates a ghastly spray of blood.  
  
“...C-Can’t do it,” she rasps.  
  
“I’ll carry you,” Tavi insists, tears in her eyes.  
  
Blood dribbles like ink past pale, cracked lips that struggle to form words.  
  
“...Tavi…” Talia croaks, shuddering. “...I need you… to-”  
  
“ _You have me_ ,” Tavi pleads. “Now, and always. I promise. Now, get up, please, please Tali…”  
  
“...live, Tavi…” Talia gasps. “I need… you… to…”  
  
And then she’s gone. Gone, down a road she expressly forbid Tavi from following. But every moment she lingered here shaved away the chances of her having a choice.  
  
Tavi buries her head in Talia’s still-warm shoulder and weeps into her chest, her grief a wretched, animal thing. In that moment, she feels an echo of what Aunt Tori must have felt, mere hours ago- that yawning abyss, the temptation to dive in and let the darkness swallow you up, to lay there in Talia’s arms and not leave her side again.  
  
Faith kept Aunt Tori standing; faith helped her keep her feet and keep moving.  
  
But what does Tavi have? What does Tavi have to keep her standing before the monstrous weight of her grief?  
  
“ **_Tavi!_ ** ”  
  
Tavi knows that voice. She’d know it anywhere- and she knows well the feeling that floods her limbs and rips her from Talia’s embrace and yanks her to her feet.  
  
Wrath. Fury would serve her, and keep her standing, where faith fell short.  
  
“ _Arc!_ ” she calls out.  
  
Across the clearing, a raider has Arc cornered. The raider scratches his chin with his war axe, slapping the haft into a meaty palm.  
  
“C’mere, pretty boy,” the raider grins. His prey is a young, unarmed cleric who hasn’t even grown the first wisp of beard- he can afford to play with his food. “Y’know, I was thinkin’ I’d just kill ya. But with looks like yours? Maybe I’ll stick you in a dress and see how much you sell for.”  
  
“You couldn’t afford me,” Arc says, glowering.  
  
“You’ve got a mouth on you,” the man grunts. “I’ll be sure to put that to good use.”  
  
Arc spits in his face. The raider raises an eyebrow, almost impressed. Then a stunning backhanded slap sends Arc reeling back, stumbling over an exposed tree root and falling onto his ass.  
  
“What’s wrong, princess? Big sis not around to save you?” the raider taunts, hefting his axe. “Well, don’t worry. She’ll get her turn, too.”  
  
Arc sits up, studying the undergrowth around him. He sees it- dried and basking in the cloister’s radiant heat, cast in silhouette like a charcoal rubbing on the page of a scholam primer. Arc closes his fist around his discovery, crumbling it to powder in his hands. He whispers a prayer of gratitude- for the Earth Mother’s bounty, and for remembering to wear gloves.  
  
“I won’t kill you,” the raider says, his wicked grin less than reassuring, “but then again, you’d be surprised what a man can live through…”  
  
The raider hefts his axe in both hands. Arc raises his gloved hand to his lips, and blows a kiss.  
  
The cloud of powdered griproot hits the raider square in the face.  
  
The raider cries out as the potent paralytic gets into his eyes, his nose, seeps into his skin. He gags and chokes, the muscles in his face seizing and constricting, his eyes screwing shut, his throat closing tight. Unable to cry out, unable to even breathe, the raider channels all his anger into a blind, vicious swing.  
  
Time seems to slow to a crawl, and it’s as if Arc himself had taken the dose of stun powder. His legs feel like jelly, and he’s too slow- too slow to evade the blow, too slow to do anything but watch his death coming, four pounds of sharpened steel on three feet of wooden haft.  
  
Arc is so in the moment that he almost doesn’t feel Tavi crashing into him from the side. Her diving tackle shoves him away from the falling axe- but not quite.  
  
They hit the ground, but Tavi’s back on her feet in an instant, charging their attacker. She shoulder tackles him down onto the ground, smashing the axe from his grip. Tavi floors him with a punch to the face, aiming for a repeat of her encounter with the previous raider- but the dusting of fine powder that comes off with the impact, and the resulting numbness in her fingers, calls for a change of plans.  
  
She picks up the man’s axe- a weapon she’s had proper training in, unlike her fists. Her second kill is cleaner than the first. But not by much.  
  
Arc is on the ground, moaning in pain. He’s clutching his mouth with a gloved hand, blood seeping through his fingers. He’s saying something, but it’s coming out muffled, gurgling, through the hand clamped over the wound.  
  
“What is it? What can I do?” Tavi asks, urgent.  
  
“A staff,” Arc says. A shocking amount of blood spills from his mouth with every word. “I need a staff.”  
  
Tavi offers him a fallen spear- the one that killed Talia, though she doesn’t say that. “Here. It’s all I’ve got.”  
  
“Lose the blade,” Arc instructs.  
  
Tavi cracks the spear against her knee and snaps off the spearhead, handing Arc the haft- a length of unblemished wood.  
  
Many clerics of Mila made use of wooden staves, often topped with magically-resonant crystal, some made entirely of crystal themselves, or petrified wood, or glass, or obsidian- all things that were born of the earth, and all worthy conduits of the Earth Mother’s power.  
  
A staff in the right hands- even a broken spear haft with no proper magical focus- is a staff that can work miracles.  
  
The soothing light of healing power is but a tiny island of blue-green amidst a sea of fiery red. So, too, is this victory: Arc is alive, with a scar down his lips and a few chipped teeth. But they’ve already lost so much; and they’ll lose more, before the night is done.  
  
“What did you hit him with?” Tavi asks. She hefts the stolen war axe over her shoulder, a raider’s hatchet tucked through her belt loops.  
  
“Griproot,” Arc explains. He tucks the broken spearhead into his belt as a makeshift dagger. “It’s not… _usually_ lethal.”  
  
Tavi shrugs. “Well, sure, not compared to an axe to the face.”  
  
“No,” Arc agrees, clutching his staff. As a novice yet to formally take vows, the unadorned wooden haft seems fitting. “But you’d be surprised what a man can live through.”  
  
A haunted quiet descends between them, broken only by the cloister’s crackling flames.  
  
“Where’s-” Arc begins, and kicks himself for asking a question he already knows the answer to. He takes a shuddering breath. “...Where’s Tali…?”  
  
And if Arc didn’t know the answer before, he certainly does now- with the lost look in Tavi’s eyes, the tortured, defeated slump of her strong, proud form. He takes a tentative step forward, one, then two, then darting forward and throwing his arms around Tavi’s neck.  
  
They hold each other, haloed in the firelight, clinging to each other just to stay on their feet.  
  
“We can’t stay here,” Arc whispers into Tavi’s throat, fighting tears. “It’s not safe.”  
  
“No,” Tavi says. “I’m not leaving.”

They part, Arc holding Tavi’s shoulder and meeting her eyes. “Tavi, listen to me. Those men are still out there-”  
  
“And so’s Aunt Tori,” Tavi insists. “So’s her house staff. If we don’t fight, tonight is a massacre- I won’t leave them behind.”  
  
“Tavi, Tali wouldn’t want you to throw your life away!”  
  
“So what, I just leave them to burn?!” Tavi snaps. She stops short, and takes a deep breath. “I’m going to fight, Arc. I’m going to save as many people as I can, and when this is over, I’m going to march up to Zofia Castle and ask where the hell Dad was when Talia died and Aunt Tori’s house burned. But before I do that, I just need to get through tonight- and I can’t… I won’t do that without you.”  
  
Tavi claps a hand on Arc’s shoulder. Their eyes meet- two matching sets of vivid crimson.  
  
“I need you,” Tavi pleads.  
  
Arc swallows hard. He reaches up, and squeezes Tavi’s hand.  
  
“You have me, Tavi,” Arc intones. “Now, and always.”  
  
The promise in Arc’s words just about bursts Tavi’s heart in her chest. She yanks him into an embrace he’s entirely unprepared for, judging by the way he wheezes when she squeezes him tight. But then they see the figures silhouetted against the flames, the ringing of steel and shouts for help.  
  
They part, and Tavi hefts her stolen war axe over her shoulder, gazing out across the estate.  
  
“Come on,” Tavi says, resolute. “We’re not losing anyone else today.”  
  
~*~  
  
From his seat in the foothills, the Conductor watched Viktoriya’s cloister burn.  
  
The performance was a success; the Chorus, delightful as always. His part of the attack done, he was free to kick back on an armchair of woven shadow, kick his feet up, and bask in the aftermath, the inferno consuming the cloister crackling almost like applause.  
  
In the shadowed world of astral space, the halfway place inhabited by dreamers, mages, and daemons, the Conductor watched the attack unfold. Living souls were motes of light, bound together in an intricate web of emotion and memory. The cloister itself shone like a bonfire at the heart of the web, a spider of flame and anguished, unquiet minds.  
  
But something was changing, up in that cloister on the hill. The tide was turning against them- something so wholly unexpected that the Conductor had almost forgotten the word for what it was.  
  
“Curious…” he muses, drumming his fingers against the staff laid across his lap.  
  
“This is taking too long,” Flint mutters, scornful, beside him. “What’s going on down there?”  
  
The Conductor smiles, amused, idly studying his fingernails.  
  
“...It would seem our forces have begun to encounter resistance.”  
  
“‘Resistance’?” Flint scoffs. “What kind of ‘resistance’?”  
  
~*~  
  
There are monsters in the flames- shadows cast by the radiant inferno, clutching steel claws and cackling like jackals when their blades meet flesh.  
  
Chef Melusine isn’t trained to fight monsters. She’s not ready to face anything that’s not about to grace the tables of the cloister refectory. Still, she clutches her fillet knife to her chest and huddles on the grass with her fellow survivors, as phantoms leap at them from the trees.  
  
A raider emerges from the flames, axe in hand. His skin is clammy and gray, and a filthy violet light fills his eyes. He bellows a war cry and charges forward, raising his axe over his head in a vicious overhand swing…  
  
A cloaked blur leaps into his path at the last second, hacking at his knee so savagely it’s a wonder his whole leg doesn’t come off. He yowls in pain, and falls, end over end, landing in a crumpled heap at Melusine’s feet. But he doesn’t die- he lifts his head with those awful, empty eyes, curls his remaining leg beneath him, and pounces.  
  
Melusine topples with a shriek. The raider grabs her by the wrists and forces her down, Melusine gasping, her arms shaking beneath his inhuman strength. Her knife wobbles in her trembling fingers, the viciously sharp blade inching towards her neck. Melusine grits her teeth. She calls upon the deepest wells of her courage, flips the knife so her thumb is behind the pommel, and punches the blade into his throat.  
  
Black ooze, too dark and treacly to be blood, dribbles out of the awful wound. Melusine shoves the raider aside, onto his back on the grass. He vomits a cloud of black smoke, and then goes still.  
  
Melusine gratefully takes the offered hand and rises to her feet- blinking in disbelief at just who’s helping her up.  
  
“P-Princess Octavia?!” she gawks.  
  
Tavi nods. Over her shoulder, Melusine can see a small crowd of survivors, armed with what weapons they could scrounge up- kitchen knives, fireplace pokers, shovels, wood axes. Tavi plucks the axe from the dead raider’s hand and then stabs a finger towards a young man in their midst.  
  
“You there! What is your profession?”  
  
“Lumberjack, Your Highness,” the man responds, blinking at the stolen axe that lands in his hands.  
  
“If you can split a log, you can split a skull,” a boy mutters grimly- a boy Melusine recognizes with a gasp as Prince Arcturus.  
  
“What do you do?” Tavi asks. She takes the fillet knife from Melusine’s hands and Melusine is still too stunned to protest.  
  
“I… I’m a chef for Sister Viktoriya and her clerics, Your Highness. I prepare the fish.”  
  
Tavi swipes blood and tar from the fillet knife with the edge of her cloak, and hands it back. She glances over to the dead raider with a hole in his throat.    
  
“You prepare the fish, huh?” Tavi flashes her a rueful grin. “Good catch.”  
  
On a night like tonight, Tavi will take every smile she can get, no matter how pained or fueled by the satisfaction of vengeance- but a war cry goes up through the trees surrounding the estate, and the smile falls from her face. Raiders surge up the hill in force, a swarm of axes, some fueled by zealotry, others by simple greed, all of them whipped into a frenzy by the bonfire atop the hill.  
  
The wave of bodies descends upon the survivors- but this time, they don’t scatter.  
  
“Rise up! Rise up and stand your ground! Resist!” Tavi bellows over the roaring flames. “ **_Resist, or they’ll kill us all!_ ** ”  
  
Raiders crash into them- a wall of meat and metal- but Tavi digs her heels in and meets the charge head on. With a thunderous cry, Tavi smashes apart the lead ranks of charging raiders, a single swing of her axe stopping the charge in its tracks. Tavi swings her axe again- and another crescent of the charge gets cut down or hurled aside. Ribbons of blood arc around her with every swing, haloing her in crimson. The raiders part around her like the sea against a stone- but one need only look at the sand to see how that match-up ends.  
  
Fortunately, Tavi doesn’t get ground down to sand- because the instant the wave of hacking axes manages to bring her down to one knee, a cloud of soothing green light suffuses her form. Tavi breathes deep of her second wind and leaps right back into the fray- with her brother, Arc, right by her side.  
  
For a moment, Melusine is privileged to bear witness to Princess Octavia and Prince Arcturus fighting side by side. It’s hardly the first time they’ve done so- and it certainly won’t be the last- but on tonight, of all nights, Melusine is certain: every chop of her axe, and every stab of his dagger, is history being written.  
  
The royal siblings in the heat of battle make for an entrancing sight- so entrancing, in fact, that Melusine almost doesn’t see the raider break through the line. He comes in screaming, wailing a war cry, his axe above his head.  
  
Arc sees him in the corner of his vision. He spins on his heel, and smacks the raider’s arms upwards with his staff.  
  
The raider’s wide open. Melusine darts in, under his guard, and lets his own momentum carry him onto her knife. The impact nearly yanks the blade out of her grip, but she braces herself, and swipes the blade aside, gutting the raider like a fish.  
  
“Princess Octavia and I must reach Sister Viktoriya!” Arc calls out, his voice straining to be heard above the chaotic melee.  
  
“She’s still inside!” comes a voice Melusine recognizes- Raglon, another member of the kitchen staff. “Sister Viktoriya and a bunch of clerics are trapped in the central courtyard. There’s no way out, and no way in through the debris!”  
  
“I know a way!” Melusine blurts out before she can stop herself.  
  
Tavi and Arc both turn to her, fixing her with their striking crimson stares. Melusine swallows hard.  
  
“We can go underground, through the cellars,” Melusine explains. “There’s a way that should lead us right to the heart of the cloister.”  
  
A stray raider bursts from the tree cover and comes at Tavi at a dead sprint, dagger raised. Tavi catches him in the chest with a sickening crunch. She drops his body at her feet, hefting her axe over her shoulder and mopping her brow with the edge of her cloak. She looks up, and Melusine catches her eyes- a flicker of exhaustion immediately masked by a grim, unbreakable resolve.  
  
“Show me.”  
  
~*~  
  
The sage’s knees hit the cloister’s stone tiles with a crack. He raises his staff, only to have it fall from his grasp when the sword slashes open his wrist- and the booted heel kicks him to the floor.  
  
Sister Ashe steps delicately over his prone form, her boot heels clicking on the stone tiles. The central courtyard is the last refuge of the cloister- open to the air, large enough to keep the smoke and flames at bay. Within that courtyard lay the last remnants of Viktoriya’s house- her staff and clergy, beaten and bloody, huddling together in a final congregation.  
  
Viktoriya emerges from the fearful press of her servants and steps forward, unafraid. In her veins, there is no more room for fear- but it is not courage that spurs her onward. It’s indignation, a righteous fury for the desecration of her halls.  
  
She can still feel the touch of dark magic in the air- the miasmal cloud, the toxic stain of the spell that had set her cloister alight. There are monsters in the flames- not mere men driven by greed or cruelty, but daemons- Terrors. Flights of gargoyles lurked in the pillar of smoke rising above, and the risen dead, revenants, defiled these holy grounds, chained by magic to their summoners, their mortal puppeteers.  
  
“Where is the girl?” Ashe demands.  
  
Viktoriya flinches at a memory, of the last time Ashe had looked at her with such intensity in her eyes. Even with Viktoriya’s clergy broken at her feet, even with her cloister burning down around her and daemons in her midst, seeing Ashe again, like this, seems like the greatest desecration.  
  
Viktoriya purses her lips. “Out of your reach.”  
  
Ashe sighs and shakes her head, something like regret flickering across her eyes.  
  
“You’re a long way from home, Sister. And you’re even further from the Faith.”  
  
“I _have_ a home,” Viktoriya says. “And though my cloister burns down around me, my home, like my faith, is not a place- it is a people.”  
  
“Your _people_ lie bleeding because of your wretched faith!” Ashe snarls. “If you had just surrendered the girl, it wouldn’t have come to this!”  
  
“I serve the High Dragons, same as you, Ashe,” Viktoriya says gently.  
  
“Then you should know that the life of a child is a small price to pay compared to the calamity that will soon befall us!” Ashe snaps. “The High Dragons are ailing- it has already begun. They are slipping into madness and ruin- and they are powerful enough to drag all Valentia to ruin along with them! To sacrifice a child… it is a worthy price. A worthy heresy.”  
  
“ _Heresy_ ?” Viktoriya hisses. “Is it not heretical enough that you’ve led Rigelian soldiers to the Zofian capital? That you assault a house of worship, that you summon Terrors to fight at your side? Your very presence here threatens the Divine Accord! This is not the Faith that sheltered me as a child- and it’s not the Faith that drives you! Arch-Cantor Halcyon would never-”  
  
“Arch-Cantor Halcyon is dead,” Ashe says, stopping Viktoriya in her tracks. “And you’re on the wrong side of this conflict. The calamity is coming. The new Arch-Cantor has seen it, and he has a solution. Soon, the time will come when loss is inevitable. Our greatest hope… our only choice is to sacrifice a few to save many.”  
  
Viktoriya exhales, long and low. She clutches her staff in both hands, as if struggling to stay standing, at a loss for words.  
  
Ashe heaves a sigh, and slides her sword back into its sheath.  
  
“Don’t you see, Vicky?” Ashe all-but-whispers. “All this pain has a purpose. The greater good. You understand, don’t you? One life will save many. One life will save us all.”  
  
Viktoriya swallows hard. Nods.  
  
“I _do_ understand,” Viktoriya murmurs. “And if it were _my_ life you were asking as the price of this salvation, then I would give it without question. But that’s my _daughter_ .”  
  
“ _What?_ ” Ashe hisses, eyes wide. She falters, taking a step back- but Viktoriya follows after her, meeting her eyes.  
  
“Listen to me, Ashe,” Viktoriya says, the strength returning to her voice. “This sickness befalling the High Dragons may be mere rumor to my ears, but in my circle are some of the finest arcane scholars this land has ever seen- and there’s a place for you at that table. Call off this attack. Come with me. Together, we will find another way.”  
  
Viktoriya reaches out her hand. Ashe flinches and pulls away, as if burned- but when next she meets Viktoriya’s eyes, she can’t look away. Her eyes flit between those eyes with the patience of a saint, and the hand reaching out. Ashe takes a shuddering breath, running her fingers through her hair.  
  
“Vicky,” she starts-  
  
-and stops short, eyes wide, breath hitching in her chest. She stumbles forward, wheezing, into Viktoriya’s arms, an arrow lodged in her back, the assassin waiting behind.  
  
“I don’t like the effect you have on my people, _Sister_ ,” Flint snarls.  
  
He nocks and looses another shot in an eyeblink, the shot punching into Viktoriya’s conjured barrier with a sound like ground glass. It floats there at chest height, lodged in a pane of solidified light. Two more arrows join the first- and an ominous crack spreads like a spiderweb across the shield…  
  
Flint already has another arrow nocked, his aim deadly, his speed inhuman. But a red-haired comet cannons into him from the side, smashing him off his feet. He hits the ground with a grunt, his shot going wide. He rolls into a crouch, readying a shot, point blank- and a knife buries itself in his wrist.  
  
Flint barks in frustration, clutching the broken spearhead transfixing his wrist- and leaps away a moment before Tavi’s axe can take his head off. He lands among his forces, Rigelian soldiers and summoned Terrors both. Their opposition stares them down, surging in from the sublevels, a ragtag militia of house staff with improvised weapons, Tavi and Arc leading the way.  
  
“Kids…?” Viktoriya wonders. “You… you came for…?”  
  
For a moment, the mother in her finds her eyes misting- but then the cleric takes over. She tenderly lays Ashe’s shivering form on the tile below, taking her staff in her hands.  
  
“Men of Rigel,” Viktoriya begins, addressing the forces arrayed against them- though she wonders how much humanity could possibly remain in the sorcerers and chained daemons surrounding her exhausted survivors. “I am Exalted Viktoriya, High Priestess of Zofia, yet you look upon one of your own.”  
  
She strides through the huddled forms of her clerics and servants, her free hand alighting upon shoulders and crowns of heads in benediction, her touch raising their eyes in wonder, her staff shining like a torch. The Rigelian forces balk at the sight of her, wary, hesitant in the radiant light…  
  
“I was born in Rigel. I served the High Dragons long before I ever served any mortal ruler of men.”  
  
Ribbons of light stream towards her, trailing behind her robes like a wedding train, gathering in a nimbus of crimson and gold atop her crystalline staff.  
  
“Sorcerers! Murderers! Madmen!” Viktoriya spits, eyes flashing with anger, her voice vicious in condemnation. “You are a _disgrace_ to the Forge Father’s name! How dare you wear his colors! How dare you call yourselves ‘Faithful’!”  
  
Viktoriya’s staff strikes the ground like a thunderclap. Power explodes around her, a shockwave of teal and emerald light that surges into the exhausted defenders beside her and suffuses them with new life, new energy. The wave of healing light sweeps away the black pall of smoke rising above the cloister, banishing weariness, dispelling fatigue.  
  
And in that same instant, like crimson stars in an emerald night, phantoms coalesce from the mist- soldiers, clad in in the crimson armor of Duma, The Forge Father, their eyes shining not sickly violet but triumphant gold.  
  
Viktoriya’s summoned champions link their shields together with a ringing clang- and a phalanx forms around the perimeter of her surviving servants, reinvigorated by her spell and readying what weapons they can bring to bear. Tavi and Arc take their place at the very head of the shield wall, unbowed, unafraid- though when they catch Viktoriya’s eyes, they break into awed, proud smiles.  
  
Viktoriya’s lips curl into an audacious grin, her hair shining like a crown. All around her, revenants, gargoyles, dumbstruck brigands and gaping sorcerers finally find their wits. They charge, howling for blood, their weapons flashing in the light.  
  
“Come, children!” Viktoriya cries. “Let us educate these _pretenders_ to the Faith!”  
  
Terrors descend upon her, shrieking and wailing- but they are silenced by her staff, striking the ground and resonating like a church bell. A dome of golden light cascades out from Viktoriya’s form. Gargoyles seize and fall from the sky, smashing to rubble against the ground, revenants vanishing into ash and dust. The human raiders crash against the shield wall with an echoing clang. They are answered by Tavi’s war cry, her shout echoed by three dozen armed house servants behind her- and matched only by Viktoriya’s words, booming like commandments from her lips.  
  
“ _Mila provides!_ ” Viktoriya screams. “ **_Duma protects!_ ** ”  
  
~*~  
  
Both in the shadowed world of astral space and the moonless night of reality, Viktoriya’s cloister blazes with light.  
  
The Conductor watches, impassive, at the lights flashing in the courtyard, at the sounds of battle rumbling like distant thunder, at the inferno consuming the cloister. In his mind’s eye, Exalted Viktoriya shines like a star, a conduit for not one, but _two_ divine dragons. She is a visionary- an exemplar of a united faith. He imagines what it would be like to break her- to put a collar and leash on such extraordinary power, and to add her magnificent voice to the Chorus. The very thought makes him shudder and lick his lips.  
  
Flint appears in a curl of black smoke, snarling in frustration and yanking a blade out of his arm. He hurls the broken spearhead into the trees, wrapping the end of his cloak around his wrist.  
  
“Rough night?” The Conductor asks dryly.  
  
“Shut up, sorcerer,” Flint spits. “And get up. We’re leaving.”  
  
The Conductor rises from his chair, the movement surreal in its smoothness. He glances at Flint, curious. “...And Sister Ashe…?”  
  
“Dead,” Flint mutters.  
  
The image of Sister Ashe- stubborn, proud, willful Ashe, bound to his will and assimilated into the Chorus- flickers across the Conductor’s mind.  
  
“Pity,” he shrugs.  
  
“This attack was too costly,” Flint says, “and the girl isn’t even here. But this King Lima has many wives, and the Brand-bearer may have been smuggled into their care. Send your acolytes into hiding. Everyone still standing, everyone capable of summoning Terrors to do their fighting. I’ll not lose any more able-bodied Rigelian troops when a conjured monster will suffice.”  
  
“Very well,” the Conductor says idly, studying his fingernails. “And what of you, Agent Flint?”  
  
Flint glowers at him, and the half-dozen glassy-eyed women hanging off his shoulders.  
  
“We have our orders,” Flint says, grim. “We return to Rigel with the Brand-bearer, or not at all.”  
  
~*~  
  
The raiders scatter into the dark, and Viktoriya and her followers follow suit- not vanishing into the trees, but gathering on the grass a safe distance from the blaze. Melusine led them out of the central courtyard, through the cellar tunnels and out into the open. Without the rush of battle fueling their senses, fatigue washes over them like a tidal wave. Some surrender to the numbing embrace of sleep. Others sit and talk quietly amongst themselves, huddled together for comfort if not for warmth, silhouetted in the firelight. Still others sit apart, speechless, stunned. They stare into the flames, lost in themselves.  
  
Tavi is among these lost souls. She sits by herself, hugging her knees to her chest. In the courtyard, fighting alongside her brother and her aunt against unholy monsters, she fully looked the part of a woman who would be queen. But here, gazing into the blazing ruin of the cloister, she is young again- a teenager on the cusp of womanhood, not ready for the loss that entails. She’s exhausted. Lost. But not alone.  
  
Tavi feels an arm around her waist. She lifts her chin off her knees, and flashes Arc a small, weary smile. She drapes an arm over his shoulder, too exhausted to even squeeze.  
  
“What do we do now, Tavi?” Arc wonders, his voice small.  
  
Tavi takes a deep breath and sighs. “...I don’t know. I want to go to the castle. I want to know who attacked us, and why. I want to know if Dad knew about it. And if he _did_ know about it, I want to know why he didn’t do a damn thing to stop it.”  
  
Arc nods, silent.  
  
“You?” Tavi asks.  
  
Arc leans over so their heads are touching. He reaches up, swiping a sleeve over his eyes.  
  
“I want to go home,” he says, his throat tight.  
  
Tavi’s breath hitches in her throat. She works her jaw, swallowing hard.  
  
Home isn’t a place. It’s a people. It’s a family. And without Talia, the halls of their villa, already too big, too empty for just the three of them, just wouldn’t be the same- not now, and never again.  
  
For one awful moment, Tavi wants nothing more than to lay down in the grass and her grief and stay there until the cloister burns down and the world makes sense again. But then she feels a hand on her shoulder, and she finds herself, somehow, with the strength to stand.  
  
Sister Viktoriya ushers Tavi and Arc to their feet. In that moment, Tavi is suddenly struck by the realization that she and Viktoriya are of a height. She’s so used to seeing her on a dais, up at the altar during service. She never knew she was just as tall as Viktoriya- taller, even. And even Arc wasn’t too far behind.  
  
The three of them lock eyes for one, warm moment, before Viktoriya pulls them both into her arms, her embrace coaxing half-stifled sobs from their throats.  
  
“I love you,” Viktoriya says, and Tavi and Arc tearfully echo the words into her robe. She smoothes their hair against their scalps, murmuring.  
  
Tavi breaks away with a gasp, suddenly remembering.  
  
“Aunt Tori! Where’s- Where’s Conrad? A-And baby Celica?!”  
  
“Shhh,” Viktoriya coos. “It’s alright. They’re safe. I’m going to see them now. Truthfully, once I do… I may not return.”  
  
Tavi and Arc’s shocked gasps are drowned out by the beating of mighty wings. An anxious ripple flashes across the crowd, fearing, perhaps, a flight of gargoyles returning for another attack- but the twin shadows descending through the shrouded sky emerge into the firelight and become pegasi, white and gleaming.  
  
Lady Alida all-but leaps from her pegasus and into Viktoriya’s arms. Her wingmate guides his own pegasus to a halt and dismounts, bowing his head to Lady Viktoriya in deference, before turning to Tavi and Arc.  
  
“Hey,” he says, hushed, urgent, “are you guys okay?”  
  
Pegasi are notoriously fickle when it comes to choosing their riders, so Khalil, a male pegasus rider, is a rarity indeed. Having been born across the sea in Archanea, an islander from a place called Talys, makes him rarer still. Having a smile that glints out from among skin the color of freshly tilled earth, and eyes that, on a night like tonight, downright shine with intensity and concern? That is what makes Khalil, in Tavi’s words, “a catch”.  
  
But it’s not Tavi who’s been ‘caught’, clasping Khalil’s hand in greeting. It’s Arc- who, despite everything else that’s happened tonight, still shyly mutters hello and has a sudden fixation with his own shoes.  
  
The moment doesn’t last. It shatters with Tavi’s cry of disbelief.  
  
“You’re _leaving_ ?”  
  
“Yes, Tavi,” Viktoriya says. The cleric, not the mother, has crept back into her voice- her words brook no argument. “For one thing, my cloister’s burned down. But home is not a place; it’s a people; it’s a family. And this family will not be safe so long as I remain here.”  
  
“But-” Tavi starts, biting her tongue when Viktoriya raises a hand.  
  
“The Duma Faithful are seeking Celica for reasons I do not yet fully understand,” Viktoriya said gently. “They were willing to attack my estate, in the heart of the Zofian capital, threatening the Accord- all to get their hands on her. I need to know why. And I need to make sure it never happens.”  
  
Tavi huffs, and stares at the ground. Arc lifts his head instead, wondering. “Where will you go?”  
  
Viktoriya hesitates. “...Perhaps it’s best if you don’t know.”  
  
“So you’re abandoning us?” Tavi blurts out, unable to hold it back. “After we’ve already lost so much-”  
  
Viktoriya pulls Tavi’s hands into hers, squeezing.  
  
“No, Tavi. Our destinies lie upon different roads- but this is not goodbye. I promise. I _will_ see you again. And until I do…”  
  
Tavi scuffs the ground with her boots, stubborn, sniffling. When Viktoriya drapes something over her shoulders, she gasps, and goes still.  
  
“I will always be with you,” Viktoriya says. She presses a kiss to Tavi’s scalp, leaving her vivid crimson outer robe draped across her niece’s shoulders. She turns to Arc, and lays her staff across her hands.  
  
Arc jerks back as if slapped. “You- You can’t!”  
  
“A broken spear haft isn’t a worthy staff for a Priest of Mila,” Viktoriya urges. “Take it, Arc. Mother Mila calls me to follow in her footsteps. I must be a mother now, not a Sister. My children are waiting for me. They need me.”  
  
“ _We_ need you,” Tavi chokes out.  
  
“You have me,” Viktoriya says, like a prayer. “Now, and always.”  
  
She draws Tavi and Arc into her embrace, and she tells herself it won’t be the last time.  
  
“Walk with the Mother, my children. And your mothers will walk with you.”  
  
~*~  
  
They go back to the edge of the woods, to the place where Talia fell. They close her eyes. They lay her out, properly, and cross her arms across her chest. They sit, and they watch the cloister’s flames kiss the shrouded, moonless sky.  
  
“You know,” Tavi begins, wistful, “for the longest time, I thought I had a crush on her. Is that weird?”  
  
“Every child has a crush on their babysitters,” Arc says, chuckling. “And, well… she was the only one I know who’s ever gotten you out of a dress.”  
  
Tavi barks out a laugh. Arc joins her. Too quickly, their laughter trickles away, becomes something hollow, pained.  
  
“You know,” Tavi starts again, her throat tight, “she bashed a guy over the head with that lantern.”  
  
“Oh, yeah?”  
  
“Yeah,” Tavi gasps, wiping her eyes. “And then when he got up again, she- she picked up a piece of glass and just- wham. Right in the throat.”  
  
“Wow,” Arc whispers. He’s smiling, but his eyes are wet. “Who knew she had that in her, huh?”  
  
Tavi takes a shuddering breath. Arc’s hand finds hers on the grass between them. She rubs a thumb across his knuckles.  
  
“Your Highnesses?”  
  
They blink, confused, and turn around. Melusine is waiting for them, her head bowed, along with half a dozen other members of the house staff. There is a cleric among them, her headdress stained with soot, and the young man, the lumberjack, from earlier that night.  
  
“Princess Octavia. Prince Arcturus,” Melusine begins, wringing her hands. She gets down on one knee, and bows her head. “You saved my life. You saved all our lives. Thank you.”  
  
_Not_ **_all_ ** _of you_ , Tavi thinks, heart aching. But she grits her teeth, and accepts their gratitude.  
  
“We have nothing precious to give you,” Melusine says. “But Lady Viktoriya has released us from her service. I offer my fealty and service to you, Your Highnesses. I pledge myself to you, in any way you see fit.”  
  
“In _any_ way…?” Tavi asks, before she can stop herself. Arc jabs an elbow into her ribs.  
  
To Tavi’s quiet relief, Melusine laughs. “You led us out of the fire, Princess. It’s only right that we should follow y-”  
  
Melusine claps a hand over her mouth. Tavi closes her eyes and exhales, knowing what she must have seen.  
  
“Her name was Talia,” Arc says quietly. “She was our caretaker. Did you know her, miss?”  
  
“Yes,” Melusine murmurs, anxiously wringing her hands. “She- We weren’t very close, but- we grew up together. At a little village, not far from here…”  
  
Tavi takes Melusine’s hands, stilling their trembling. Tavi meets her gaze, her eyes dark with grief.  
  
“Show me.”  
  
Tavi and Arc watch, from a distance, as their makeshift funeral procession takes shape- Talia, wrapped in the largest and cleanest piece of linen they could find from within the shattered cloister; laid out on a stretcher made from lengths of cut wood lashed together into a frame. It will be hard going, without a cart. But two of their number- the lumberjack Gerard, and Harris, who worked in the stables- volunteered to carry her, and they wouldn’t be denied.  
  
Arc leans his head against Viktoriya’s staff. It thrums with her energy, echoes of the power she wielded against the Duma Faithful in the courtyard mere hours before. Tavi appears behind him, bumping an elbow against his.  
  
“Still want to go home?” she asks.  
  
Arc takes a deep breath and sighs, shoving his doubts and fears away.  
  
“I have a home,” he says, resolute. “Where do we go from here, Tavi?”  
  
“Talia. Dad. And after that... “ Tavi gestures vaguely, shrugging. “...who knows.”  
  
Lightning flashes, high above. Thunder claps. And from the moonless night, rain starts to fall- as if Mila herself were weeping with them.  
  
But Tavi and Arc’s tears are spent. They have their mission. And they have each other.  
  
The rain comes down, tentatively at first, then in sheets. It smothers the burning cloister. The pall of black smoke hanging above the cloister gets cut through with streaks of white.  
  
Arc clutches Aunt Tori’s staff in his hands, watching the rain wash away a night of heartache.  
  
“Mila provides,” he says.  
  
Beside him, Tavi pulls up the hood of her vivid red robe, a war axe as a walking stick, a hatchet in her belt.  
  
“Duma protects.”  
  
~*~  
  
In the skies above Zofia, Viktoriya prays.  
  
She’s clinging to Alida, her arms around her waist. Behind them, to their right, Khalil rides, an unconscious Ashe leaning against his chest. Captain Mycen is waiting for them on the edge of Fleecer’s Forest, somewhere in the vast, verdant expanse down below- but all Viktoriya can think about is the fire.  
  
“How many do you think made it out?” Alida wonders.  
  
Viktoriya sighs. “Not enough.”  
  
Viktoriya’s thoughts drift. To Liprica, to Celica, to her sister-wives and nieces and nephews. She thinks of Ashe, and her unsettling news of sickness ailing the High Dragons, and strife within Rigel. She thinks of the Duma Faithful, failing to capture Celica and yet setting things in motion she couldn’t begin to understand. She thinks of Rigelian troops crossing the border, threatening the Accord. She thinks of her damnable husband Lima, safe on his throne while his children fight for their lives.  
  
She thinks of her son, Conrad. She thinks of Liprica’s daughter- _their_ daughter, Celica. She thinks of Arc and Tavi, equally her children, alone in the wilderness, somewhere in the vast dark racing beneath their feet.  
  
She thinks of the fire blazing above her ruined cloister, so much like a funeral pyre.  
  
Viktoriya exhales. She prays, her words lost to the wind rushing past, meant for no one’s ears save the divine.  
  
“Exalted Mila, giver of life, giver of your bounty, and mother to us all: I ask of you a final boon.  
  
“Take your servants into your loving embrace.  
  
“Guide these souls to a place of plenty, where justice is swift, pain is fleeting, and love is everlasting. Plant these souls in your garden, Mila, and there, they shall bloom, evergreen…”  
  
Viktoriya takes a deep breath, and sighs. Her grip tightens around Alida’s waist. Alida’s hand finds hers, and squeezes.  
  
“...Exalted Duma, defender of the virtuous, defender of hearth and home… may the light of your forge guide those who live, yet walk in darkness. May the tools of your making guide them to victory; shield them with courage, arm them with faith, and on the battlefields to come, may they never fight alone…”  
  
Viktoriya’s words ring in the ears of those who cannot answer. For they hear, not a prayer, but a song- a wicked melody that will tear Zofia in two, and with it, all Valentia.  
  
Lady Liprica is dead. Princess Celica is but a babe in arms. Still, they can hear the song that will tear nations apart.  
  
Octavia’s rebellion is a twinkle in the distance; her rebels number, currently, her brother and a handful of volunteers. They do not yet realize history is being written. But they, too, can hear the song.  
  
A Brand-bearer has been born in Zofia. The Duma Faithful will spend too much time and too many troops trying to find her. Soon, however, another Brand-bearer will be born, this one right within the walls of Castle Rigel.    
  
He, too, will hear the song…  
  
It is a song of calamity; of tragedy; of mourning. It is a funeral hymn; a song of the dead.    
  
Listen. Can you hear it?  
  
The Requiem has begun.  
  
~*~


End file.
